//------------------------------// // ...and ends so soon. // Story: A Speculative Spectrum // by Waxworks //------------------------------// Her return train pulled into the station with the squeal of metal. Pinkie leaned on the doors with her face against the glass until they opened, then zipped past other passengers as she raced down the road toward Fluttershy’s cottage. The animals that were ever-present at the little cottage were milling about. Birds and butterflies fluttered about the windows perching on one branch or flower then moving to the next. Squirrels clambered up the vines and lattice on the walls of the cottage, while other animals milled about outside. Their lazy and relaxed manner seemed to indicate that they had been fed not too long ago. That would mean Fluttershy was likely at home. Pinkie bounced around the sides of the cottage, looking to see if Fluttershy was feeding the chickens, but after a full circuit of the house, there wasn’t anypony outside. She returned to the front door and rapped on it with a hoof. Soft hoofsteps could be heard inside the cottage. They approached the door and opened it to show Fluttershy hidden slightly behind it. When she saw it was Pinkie Pie, she smiled and stood up straighter, opening the door wider for her friend. “Oh, hello, Pinkie Pie. What brings you here?” Fluttershy stepped to the side and motioned for Pinkie to enter. Pinkie Pie pranced past her and into the cottage. “Good afternoon, Fluttershy! I actually came here to ask you some questions about Discord.” “Oh?” Fluttershy shut the door and walked to the kitchen, where she started preparing some tea for her unexpected guest. “If you want to know when his birthday is, he said he doesn’t really have one, so he’ll accept whatever day you want to throw him a party.” “No, nothing like that, though I should really throw him a birthday party sometime. I wanted to talk to him,” Pinkie said. Fluttershy stuck her head out of the kitchen, confused. “You want to talk to him? Nopony ever wants to talk to Discord but me. What about, if I may ask?” “Colors!” Pinkie threw her hooves into the air, tossing a small hoofful of confetti. “Colors? What about them?” “I want to know if he–as the spirit of chaos–knows of any colors we don’t already have, or if he could create a new one!” “A new color?” Fluttershy’s brow furrowed as she tried to imagine one. “What would that even look like?” “I don’t know, but it would suuuuper neato! I figure if seeing the seven colors of the rainbow made me so happy when I was a filly, a new color would make other ponies happy!” Fluttershy brought out the tea and passed Pinkie Pie a cup. She sat in an armchair and inhaled the gentle aroma of her tea, then smiled. “Well, I don’t know anything about that, but I can send him a message. He’ll be coming for our weekly tea party too, and I can mention it then. I’m sure he’d be more than happy to talk about something so… odd.” “Perfect! Thanks, Fluttershy. You’re a real pal!” Pinkie reached over and hugged her friend. Fluttershy had to hold both her saucer and cup above her head until Pinkie let go. “Oof! You’re welcome, Pinkie.” When she received the letter from Fluttershy that Discord was willing to meet, Pinkie could hardly contain her excitement. The day came, and as soon as the sun was up Pinkie was on the path to Fluttershy’s cottage. When she arrived, she could see the animals were still ever-present; chirping, growling, and snuffling as they were wont to do. Pinkie Pie marched on up past them, and reached out a hoof to strike the door. She knocked, and after the third knock, Pinkie lowered her hoof and noticed the animal sounds were gone. She turned away from the door and saw that the animals that had been everywhere not five seconds before, were all missing. Along with most of the ground. And the sky. It had all been replaced by a curious starscape of floating islands and shifting clouds. Her attention was drawn back to the door when she heard the latch open, and Discord appeared in the doorway. He smiled that welcoming smile that implied he was privy to a joke nopony else was, and motioned for her to step inside. “Welcome, Pinkie Pie. Fluttershy told me you wanted to talk to me,” Discord said. Pinkie took the change of scenery in stride. When dealing with chaos, nothing was out of bounds and it was just best to accept that. “Well hey, Discord! Fancy door you got. It looked like Fluttershy's door when I first got here!” Pinkie stepped into Discord’s home and gawped at the strange décor. A table floated past her muzzle and she giggled. Discord shut the door behind her and watched her admiring his home. After a moment to let her look, he steepled his claw and talon together and cleared his throat. “As much as I appreciate your admiration, I’m a little excited myself to get down to business. Fluttershy told me you wanted to talk about colors.” Pinkie Pie whirled to face Discord and put on as serious a face as she could manage. “Exactly! This is for the good of ponies everywhere! I want—” Pinkie whipped a hoof up to point at Discord’s face and waited for dramatic effect “—a new color!” “A new color, hmm? What’s wrong with the old ones?” “Everypony has seen them! I can put streamers up for a birthday party in red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, or violet or any hue in between, and everypony has seen them before!” Pinkie ranted. “Even if we used magic to allow ponies to see invisible colors, that wouldn’t be enough. I asked Twilight and Celestia about that, and those colors already exist! I want something brand new!” Pinkie stabbed a hoof at Discord for punctuation. Discord smiled wide. “Why, you’re right! Everypony has seen them, haven’t they? And there’s only seven of them. That’s quite a drag. Why not leave them at a nice even number, like ten or fifteen?” “Right? There should be way more! Something as awesome as colors has so much potential! We already have so many hues with seven. Think of how many we could have with fifteen?” “Why, the possibilities might become effectively infinite! That’s a wonderful idea, Pinkie.” He curled down to bring his face closer to hers. “As it happens, I know of extra colors. I’ve even seen a few.” “So, you do know of new colors? I knew it!” Pinkie grabbed Discord by the head and pulled his nose against hers. “What kind? What are they like?” “Well, there’s such a thing as the color of magic in a world far from this one. They call it ‘octarine’, but that won’t do for you. Only those who use magic can see it.” “Hmmm, yeah. That would be neat for unicorns, but other ponies get left out. That’s no good at all.” “Oh, but don’t fret, there are others. There’s a new color inside an ark hidden in a place called Area 51. Some grave-robber-cum-archaeologist found it.” Discord scratched his chin in thought. “That one may not be what you’re looking for either. It causes an agonizing death upon those who see it.” “Colors that cause death?” Pinkie shook her head. “I don’t want them to cause death, I want ponies who see it to be happy!”  “You’re right, of course. Happiness. Not death.” Discord tugged on his beard for a moment, then reached behind him and pulled out a notebook. “Let’s see… dismemberment. Uncontrollable plant growth. No, the cenobites only have several hundred hues of pain. The color of warm toast on a rainy day in spring while staring out the window in reflective melancholy. That doesn’t sound happy.” He flipped through a few more pages while Pinkie Pie watched, then he looked down at her and snapped the booklet shut. “Tell you what, Pinkie. Since picking a new color out of the thousands upon thousands of different options available to me is so much trouble, how would you like to instead see your current colors in a different way?” “A different way? Like Rarity’s designs?” “Ohhhhohoho, no. A way I can guarantee nopony has ever imagined before.” Discord winked and smiled at her. Pinkie put a hoof to her chin in thought. She hemmed and hawed and rolled her head about as she pondered his words. She thought to herself for a minute or so, then whipped about and pointed a hoof at him. “Why don’t you want me to have a new color?” He held up his hands, trying his best to look innocent. “I swear I’m not trying to stop you, I’m just saying you could have the opportunity to take a look at the colors you have. Maybe you’ll find a way to work with existing colors instead of dredging up dangerous ones. You never know, maybe you’ll be inspired.” Discord grinned at her. “Hmmm. Okey-dokey-lokey. But this better not be a prank. I’m super serious about this!” Pinkie Pie frowned and looked askance at Discord. “Cross my heart and hope to fly, stick a cupcake in my eye.” Discord made a cupcake appear and smushed it into his face for emphasis. He looked at Pinkie afterward and smiled. “Okay. Do some chaos, Discord!” “With utmost pleasure. You may feel a little disoriented.” Discord snapped his fingers, and Pinkie’s eyes began to ache. At first, nothing seemed different. Pinkie blinked and squinted as her eyes hurt her. She shook her head and blinked rapidly, trying to clear the pain, but nothing worked. “Discord, what did you do?” “Why don’t we go back to Fluttershy’s place and have a look outside? That should answer all your questions.” Discord snapped his fingers again, and Pinkie could once again see the trees and animals that all lived around Fluttershy’s cottage. Pinkie focused on the leaves of a nearby tree. They began as green, but as the ache in her eyes became more acute, the green started to slide off the tree. It swam away from the trunk, and coalesced into a floating sphere of color. After it had gathered together, the sphere burst, throwing green all over the landscape. Everywhere the green landed, it sucked the color out of the objects it touched, mixing the colors together. As they changed, they grew, and floated away from the objects they came from. Then those burst and splattered everywhere. The process repeated several times, until everything on the ground was black and white and different shades of grey. The colors mixed together until there was nothing but a morass of very dark brown. They formed a ball that eclipsed the light coming from above and began floating upward. The sky darkened above her as she followed the orb into the path of the sun, where it spread out across the sky, darkening everything, and opening a hole directly above Pinkie, allowing her to see the sun. When that celestial orb entered her vision, everything exploded in color. Everything she had been looking at, all the colors and the blacks, whites, and greys, were all obliterated. Every color was washed away as her eyes were filled with sunlight. She lost herself in the light and felt herself movie. After she stopped, she looked around and found herself far above Equestria, looking down at a black and white landscape that stretched off in all directions. The familiar sight of Ponyville was a black and white spot next to a black and white forest. South of them was a black and white river leading down a black and white gorge. Near that was a black and white badlands there a black and white Appleoosa had been built. She looked back north and there, built into a black and white mountain was a black and white Canterlot. Its black and white spires unimpressive against a black and white backdrop everywhere you looked. As Pinkie watched, color began to bleed into the scene before her. First red made its way into the landscape. The dusty plains to the south became stark and unforgiving as the pillars and sands shaded in. Yellow joined them soon after, flowers across Equestria filling the plains they lived in, bringing light and life. The golden spires of Canterlot became obvious and regal above the still black-and-white mountain it sat upon. Then came the greens. Forests and plains became lush and full of vitality as green infused their leaves and stalks. Colors mixed together and the brown of tree trunks could be seen as blue filled the lakes, oceans, and rivers criss-crossing the land. Crystals to the north shone with indigo light as the final colors made their way into the landscape, and violet joined it soon after, giving a rich yet dark lifeblood to the rest of the colors. When all the colors had returned, Pinkies vision zoomed out, passing back across the spectrum as they smeared all together: Violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, and red. Then everything went white. Then suddenly back to yellow.  “Pinkie Pie?” A voice said. The yellow in front of Pinkie’s eyes waved up and down. “Pinkie, you shouldn’t stare at the sun for so long. It’s dangerous,” Fluttershy said. Pinkie Pie blinked, the afterimages of the sun’s light glowing in her vision. She turned to look at Fluttershy, and blinked again. “Um… Pinkie, you have a little something… right here.” Fluttershy wiped the corner of her own mouth and pointed at Pinkie Pie. Pinkie closed her mouth that she wasn’t aware was open, then wiped the corner of her mouth Fluttershy had indicated with a hoof. She had been drooling. Pinkie looked around. The tree she had looked at was green, as was the grass. The creek, grass, and bridge near Fluttershy’s house were fine, and all their colors were where they should be. The dandelions were yellow, and the roses were red, and yellow and black bees buzzed from one to the next under gently scudding clouds of white. Pinkie stared. She blinked yet again, and turned her head to look at Fluttershy. For what seemed like the first time, she really looked at Fluttershy. Her friend had a yellow coat, and her pink mane and tail draped down across it in an exquisite manner. The soft pastels of her coloring really drew out the cool blue of her eyes, and the longer Pinkie stared, the more amazing her friend’s colors looked. Fluttershy looked concerned, but Pinkie’s gormless expression quickly gave way to a small smile which widened the longer she stared. Pinkie’s mane, which had been listless before, slowly fluffed itself up to its usual bright and poofy self along with her widening smile. “Are you… okay, Pinkie?” Fluttershy asked. “Okay?! I’m better than okay! I’m grrrreat!” “Oh, that’s–” “In fact, I’m amazing! I understand now! It wasn’t the colors that were wrong, it was me! I wasn’t seeing the value of what we already have! We don’t need anything new to truly be happy, we need to understand the true value of what’s already here!” Pinkie bounced around Fluttershy, her excitement bubbling out of her in an unstoppable deluge. “So, what–” “I know exactly what I’m going to do! I’m going to go home, and I’m going to bake a cake! It’ll be an amazing cake! It’ll have icing, loads of icing! Icing of every color of the rainbow!” Pinkie grabbed Fluttershy’s hooves and danced in a small circle with her. “It doesn’t matter if the happiness I bring ponies disappears, because I can always make them happy again! Balloons, cupcakes, wrapping paper, streamers. Whatever it takes! That’s what makes their smiles worthwhile!” Pinkie Pie bounded down the dirt road away from Fluttershy’s cabin, shouting back excitedly. “Tell Discord I said thank youuuuuu!” Pinkie bounded down the road, leaving her friend behind. She watched the trees, flowers, and animals pass by, and admired each and every one of them for the colors they had. They may have been the same colors they always had been, but without them, they wouldn’t be nearly as interesting as they were. Life on the rock farm had seemed grey to her when living in it, but if one life had been without color for so long, there was no sense taking the ones she had now for granted. Now was for parties. Now was for balloons. Now was for icing. Now, was for rainbows. The end.